The Flying Gypsy’s blog

Here's something I've never heard anyone tell me before: "It was such a good book, I had to stop reading it."

But ... That's what I did with "The Stranger."  Yes, "The Stranger" by Albert Camus.

I just couldn't bear to find out what happened to the protagonist.

Once he was sentenced to die ... Or a few pages past it, I decided I couldn't bear his execution.  Stopped reading, don't know the ending.  Don't tell me.

Don't know many writers who could draw me that far into a character that I would quit the story.  In fact, I can't think of any others.

###

I'm marrying my cousin and his fiancee.

No, it's not a sordid tale of incest and polyamory.

Rather, it will be my honor, June 29, 2008 to perform a second nuptial conjugation.

In case anyone out there is thinking to get baptized, my rates are incredibly reasonable ... Indeed, I'm sure I'd offer quite a discount for anyone providing his or her own font & gown.

The only downside to this is that I'll probably have to invest in a suit ... as I have long-since ruined the slacks to the suit I wore to my own wedding ...  The fun part of this is ... I've got the textured blue coat from that suit + a hand-me-down green herring-bone jacket I'm rather fond of.  I think I'll take both along with me and tell the man on the dry goods floor that I'm looking for a suit which slacks I could share to each of those jackets as needed. 

Can't you just see the cartoonish zig-zag mouth he'll make now?

###

I can't recall, but I feel that I lied earlier in this space.

Until a few weeks ago, I was pretty sure I was soon to own my first automobile.

Sure.  I inherited a 1973 Chevy Nova from my grandfather and repaired it into the junkyard, after driving it -- happily -- through my late teens.

But, not until recently did I recall the 1972 Plymouth Fury I actually bought from the banjo player in my Dad's bluegrass band.  What a land yacht!  (Will try to post a picture ...) It made -- maybe? -- four trips before I gave up on it.  One or two though were wildly important in transferring belongings from one U-District apartment to another.  Talk about a capacious trunk.

Too, I co-owned two trucks with my best friend.  One stolen in Fraser Lake, BC and put into a ravine in Burns Lake.  The other probably still on the road somewhere in Pittsburgh and a trusty steed on a journey to Alaska and a doubly longer one from Alaska to here in Raleigh, NC.

Anyway ... I finally got the plates for my "new" 220,000-mile-old truck ... Sadly, I fear, long after the last drive-in theater in my neighborhood has closed.

###

What is the best beer on planet Earth? 
Submitted by Remmy Van Hornie.

The best beer on the planet isn't here anymore.  The best beer that's been on the planet was Chinook Jargon Stout, the first homebrew I ever made.

Bottled into 6-1/2 oz. Coke bottles (for the most part) and variable bottle-to-bottle in effervescence, as I'd not yet learned the importance of the amount of air left at the top of the bottle.  Will never forget quaffing a few around a campfire me, Shooter and Jake kindled after a day of rock climbing in the Icicle Creek canyon just outside Leavenworth, WA.

###

I've been thinking some about my other neighborhood.  The one I live in and survey from my front porch.

It's a great one, at that.  Here's the skinny.  I share a wall with Andre and his mother, L.E.  Across the street is Sue, a Montessori teacher who seems to share her home with two post-college children.  She invites me over occasionally to sit on the porch, gab and sip wine.  I love hearing her call her cats in at night.

Next door to the North of Sue is an 8-plex where I know Michael, Jeffrey, Steve and Mike.  Steve is also a teacher and we keep talking about playing some guitar together.  I'm sure it will happen soon.

At the end of my side of the street are the Joneses.  Mom, dad & 'Big Girl Cleo' and her little sister Nora.  Way on the south end of the street, nearest the beer store live Frake the jazz drummer and his wife and two daughters.  Next door to them are Fred, Christina and 15-month old Emma.

Coming back this way, but on my side of the street is Lisa, the animal rescue woman, the gay couple living in a structure entirely redesigned inside a corner store shell.  Across the street from Lisa and the corner store is a couple who own a Cadillac plastered with Masonic bumper stickers, then a woman who is known as the neighborhood gossip, and then Richard, Roberta and their daughter, Rachel, and an adorable beagle named Casper.  My porch swing was salvaged from their rubbish heap. 

Nearest them, and two doors south of Sue is a couple who own luxury cars.  One Lexus SUV and a BMW with a Demon Deacons bumper sticker.  They removed two huge oaks from their front yard not long ago.  They also lived in a second home while their floors were refinished and their rubbish heap often includes evidence of healthy -- even indulgent -- consumption of durable goods.  The woman of this household could be confused for  a slightly emaciated older sibling of the -- dare I admit I've noticed? -- voluptuous teenage baby sitters the family uses.

Immediately north of the conspicuous consumers is a single Asian woman who does all her own landscaping.  She is in the house that used to be home to a couple and two sets of fraternal twins.  Even Sue is unsure of her name, though they share a fence.

Finally, across the street from her is a photo studio owned by a woman who adopted a kitten from me by kidnapping it on Independence Day 2006.  To her east is James, who sold me a truck and stands on a 5-gallon bucket to see over his fence when he wants to gab.

What a great gang, eh?  Will post pictures soon.

###

Who would you trust with your life?

Fantastic question that deserves to be turned on it's head.

My once-upon-a-time rock climbing adventures suggest you ought never trust your life to anyone who wouldn't -- or *SHOULDN'T* -- trust his or hers to you.

Any child's life is more important than my own.  Accordingly, I would trust my life to any child.

Among the people I've known and loved, there are few with whom I'd trust my life -- four at most.

One of the few I would trust is already gone, but saved my life once (on a rock face) and added so much to it that I couldn't repay him with an eternity of chances.

To fully trust someone with your life, you've got to be confident she would embrace and pursue the slimmest chances rather than depend on prudence.

You must both agree that there is a time for giving up and mucking the hand, but that you both came to play until the game is over.

###

Who are the people you've worked with over the years that you'd list as your Coworker Superstars? Why'd they make the cut? 
Submitted by bodhibound.

So, I've worked with some great folks over the years.  But, this is about a guy I'll never forget.

Less a co-worker than a customer, I suppose.

My first real job was the summer after high school.  I sold a crooked tip-sheet at a crooked race track.  A guy I knew from auto shop, who sold sno-cones at a stall in back of the public pool and fronting this beach* hired me.  It was great, except ... except, I had to take the early bus long before the first race, and closed the stand after the second race ... and, the first bus home didn't leave until after the fourth race.

And, I got paid in cash.  As a consequence, I often left most of my wages at the betting windows.

Now, Navy Joe also rode the bus.

"I'm just in it for the intrigue," he said of the races, fanning outstretched fingers in the air and grinning broadly around a dimming cigarette.

We'd speculate on the races we didn't bet, how to watch the windows and time your own wager to keep a step ahead of the syndicates whose bets altered the odds when it was too late for the tote board to show it.

What I most remember about Navy Joe, though, is how ... months after I'd disappeared to college in the Midwest, he sent me a few bucks.  I really mean a few bucks.  Maybe it was $6?  But, he was sharing the wealth of good fortune that disrupted his outings very seldom.  The dough came with a little advice I've long since forgotten.

As Navy approached the ponies, I try to confront life:  "Just in it for the intrigue, don'cha know?"

* - Photo borrowed from tackyspoons

###

Here's a puzzler for you.

The following sequence is missing an item, signified by the ellipsis:

:1h, :11, :1H, ..., :2U, :21

What element is omitted?

(Hint: It might help to change the font used, and there is a significant difference between 1h and 1H.)

Another hint, this sequence is also accurate and the same element is missing:

:lh, :ll, :lH, ..., :2U, :2l

For an additional challenge:

Where did I observe this sequence?

What difficulty will duplicates in an expanded version of this sequence present for the observer?

###

As promised, J. left the tract where I could find it and I've dutifully read it.

I was SHOCKED, I tell you ... SHOCKED that my favorite Bible verse was missing from it:

Matthew 19:24 -- "Again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."

Should you wish to order a few copies for yourself, friends and neighbors www.chick.com.

Well, the power just went out, which was the other thing I wanted to write about.  We had one heck of an enjoyable thunderstorm blow through a few moments ago.

Did you ever notice there's always that one bird flying sideways and struggling against the wind in the moments before a really good storm lets loose?

Have you also noticed that it seems as though early in the storm, one of the first sounds heard is a siren?

Last one, then ... I've a few sunflowers in the front yard.  The sort that turn from bright yellow to rusty colored.   Useless for seeds.  Entirely ornamental, which I'm usually against.  Planted on top of Kayo's burial spot.  At least two of them are taller than me and swayed wildly in the wind.  How DO they stay standing?

Nature sure is something.

###

Posting is more uncomfortable tonight than usual, which is saying something.

I know I've only one reliable reader, to start with.  And, I thank her -- as always -- for the indulgence.  She'll need some extra patience whenever she reads this one.

On the other hand, the anonymity and happenstance of this medium might lead someone to bounce through here just as I discovered:  the refreshingly back-woods perspective of Anita at Poplar Road, the contradictory observations of a feminist on a diet shared by K-Spot, the thoroughly captivating photography of Inthegan, the self-indulgent, but creative adventures of JenBlog, and the heroism of Heather Corinna.

So, here's the story:

I grew weary of my own company again tonight and set out to be near breathing, eating, drinking, laughing, shy, bold and confused others.

At the corner store, J. stopped me and promised he wouldn't ask me for money, since I'd donated a whole dollar to his cause one or two nights earlier.  J.'s wiry build, ash-speckled polo shirt, and piercing blue eyes teetered on the pavement as he showed me an evangelical tract he'd discovered.  "How to Get Rich (and Keep it)" ... It was a graphic novel folded two-dozen flimsy pages thick into a three-by-five booklet.

After recounting his recent run-in with the store clerk and two bygone encounters with the police, J. promised he'd read and then leave the tract somewhere I could find it.

Thanking him, I made my way -- instead of the usual haunt -- to a bar I rarely frequent.  Half-way through a beer, E. asked if the seat near me was taken and we chatted amiably while she ate half a very small pizza and sipped a Coke.

E. told me about the music she likes and about saving her aunt's voice from the curled ribbon of a nearly destroyed cassette.  I told her about how there was a time when booths captured and dispensed recorded voices on souvenir records.

E. is soon to be out of work, I'm soon to start back.  She quit her job because there wasn't enough challenge.  She could wait two years for the receptionist to retire but, in the meantime, there wasn't anything for her to do except draw the paycheck.

Sounded like she was giving up a dream job, I thought.  Indeed, I ordered another beer to open my mind to the concept.

She might work as a waitress, she explained.  And, then, made me tell her twice she was attractive.  Had she not heard me?  Or, doesn't she hear it often enough?

I understood that she didn't want me walking her all the way home.  She is far younger than me, but confessed -- as we climbed the hill towards both our homes -- that she counts anyone who talks with her as a friend.

E. can drive, but isn't allowed to.  I matched her very slow pace so I could enjoy her smile.

As we passed the corner store, there was J. perched on the four-inch brick ledge beneath the window.  A darkened neon sign, the edge of a telephone booth and the stainless gleaming, backside of an enormous beer cooler framed him.  Under the fluorescence tucked in the awning above, J. bowed his head to the pages of the tract he's promised to leave for me.

At the corner, E. continued west, and I turned north.

"I sure hope I run into you again, soon."

###